In The Public Interest: Restoring the Constitution

Barack Obama is receiving lots of advice from many people these days about the collapse of Wall Street, the sinking economy and the quagmire wars he will inherit from the Bush regime. However, there is one important matter that he alone can address with his legal training and the sworn oath he will take on January 20 to uphold the Constitution. That phenomenon is the systemic, chronic lawlessness and criminality of the Bush/Cheney regime which he must unravel and stop.

To handle this immense responsibility as President, he needs to bring together a volunteer task force of very knowledgeable persons plus wise, retired civil servants to inventory the outlaw workings of this rogue regime.

Much is already known and documented officially and by academic studies and media reporting. In the category of "high crimes and misdemeanors", are (1) the criminal war/occupation of Iraq, (2) systemic torture as a White House policy, (3) arrests of thousands of Americans without charges or habeas corpus rights, (4) spying on large numbers of Americans without judicial warrants and (5) hundreds of signing statements by George W. Bush declaring that, he of the unitary presidency, will decide whether to obey the enacted bills or not.

To its everlasting credit, the conservative American Bar Association sent to President Bush three reports in 2005-2006 concluding that he has been engaged in continuing serious violations of the Constitution. This is no one-time Watergate obstruction of justice episode ala Nixon that led to his resignation just before his impeachment in the House of Representatives.

Nearly two years ago Senator Obama, contrary to what he knows and believes, vigorously came out against the House commencing impeachment proceedings. It would be too divisive, he said. As one of one hundred Senators who might have had to try the President and Vice President in the Senate were the House to impeach. He should have kept impartial and remained silent on the subject.

As President, he cannot remain silent and do nothing, otherwise he will inherit the war crimes of Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney and become soon thereafter a war criminal himself. Inaction cannot be an option.

Violating the Constitution and federal laws is now routine. What is routine after awhile becomes institutionalized lawlessness by official outlaws.

Domestic Policy abuses are also rampant. Just what are the limits of the statutory authority of the U.S. Treasury Department or the government within a government funded by bank assessments known as the Federal Reserve?

Don’t read the $750 billion bailout law for any answers! The Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi and the Majority Leader of the Senate, Harry Reid just sent a letter to Bush asking whether the White House believes the bailout law could be interpreted to save not just the reckless banks, but also the grossly mismanaged Big Three auto companies in Michigan.

Didn’t Congress know what they were or were not authorizing? Or did the stampede started by the demanding Bush result in blanket, or panicked ambiguity by a cowardly Congress?

This week, the Washington Post front paged an article that the Treasury Department unilaterally gave the banks a tax break that was estimated to be worth a staggering $140 billion. Just like that! Fiat! The Post reported that impartial legal experts flatly declared such a decision to be without statutory authority which means the Bush regime usurped the constitutional authority of Congress in matters of taxation and basically took out a 22 year old law enacted by Congress. Not to be outdone, on the same day, the lead article in the New York Times reported a four-year-old Bush doctrine allowing Special Forces and other armed force to pursue terrorists in any country in the world. The Times specified incursions at will into Syria, Iran, Somalia, Pakistan and other countries.

Such violations of national sovereignty without formal declarations of war or through formal interventions by the United Nations are violations of international law. The Bush government answers this assertion by its open-ended, totally self-defined, right of "self-defense" under the UN Charter. The same self-determining argument can be made by covert terrorists or covert actions by adversarial governments. This is an example of make-up-your-own international law to suit your own covert operations.

As a country that has the most to lose from the shredding of international law and order, the United States under Bush is giving many IOUs to revenge-minded suicidal adversaries. They can simply to their mass audiences say, if the U.S. can do anything it wants, why shouldn’t they?

It has been widely reported that the Justice Department under Mr. Ashcroft and Mr. Gonzalez epitomized contempt for compliance with the laws regarding civil liberties, due process and politically interfering with U.S. Attorneys.

Less publicized was its refusal to enforce the laws routinely transgressed by the corporate patrons of the White House: such as environmental crimes, consumer fraud, and anti-trust violations.

Obama has tools to restore law and order by the government itself. The Bully Pulpit. Ordering departmental directives. Issuing Executive Orders. Requesting legislation. Highlighting the integrity of the subdued and buffeted federal civil service which, with its oath of office, deserves far more effective whistleblowing protection laws.

The ACLU has just released: "Actions For Restoring America: How to Begin Repairing the Damage to Freedom in America After Bush." Mr. Obama would do well to use this important report as blueprint for restoring faith in the U.S. Government’s commitment to the Constitution (see http://www.aclu.org/transition/). A second report titled: "Protecting Public Health and the Environment by the Stroke of a Presidential Pen by the Center for Progressive Reform suggests several Executive Orders that Mr. Obama could sign to advance important health, safety and the environment goals (see http://www.progressivereform.org/).

Barack Obama taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago. Let’s have it operate out of the Obama White House. And the time to start laying the groundwork is now!

Comment viewing options

The ACLU has a "TO DO LIST" for the new president, but during the time that crimes against the Constitution were committed by Bushco, the ACLU remained silent on calling for immediate impeachment proceedings in Congress.

Mr.NSA/CIA Hayden and Bush have been busy trying to enslave every American with all those SIGINT,DOMINT,EMF and RNM...

Deadly technology to enslave every AMERICAN...

I've contacted my state ACLU,,who should contact every states ACLU as this is a NATIONAL problem,,

So I'm trying to connect the following,,
ACLU our champs of Civil Rights and Liberties
EFF(Electronic Frontier Foundation) our champs of knowing Eltronics.
Wanttoknow.info..champs of many experts,,from authors who have interviewed many,,scholars,former Intelligence and couter Intellingence,,just a whole host of knowing people..
This website a champ of fighting for justice,liberty,freedoms with many connected to top government people...

Many of you have lawsuits against the NSA and AT&T....
I hope my email has reached every one of you...
I don't know,,I have a little outside interference...

An agency that's connected very Internationally that I think has stopped Bush and Mr.NSA from enslaving the entire Nation..

Will call them the Super Secret Secret Service...
These boys have some nasty technology also,,,
I just had a email come threw,,before I could move my mouse to open it,,POOF it was gone,,,Hmm
I was very excited when this email popped up,,My Daily Spam Report,,,thinking I might have gotten a reply form one of the above organizations I wrote....
But POOF that email was gone,,,Hmm
Went to my deleted box,,,NO Daily Spam Report,,,

Maybe we should mention a couple of other NSA technology type abilities...
As with everything it's done 2-3 times until I say,,"Oh that's you"...

The pulse that went threw my finger,,the finger you use for your mouse,,,A pulse that made my finger literally jump up...

Or maybe the little arrow that you move with the mouse,,,
My hand was off the mouse and the little arrow moved all by itself,,,
It literally went from the lower half of the screen to the top,,,
As with everything until I said,,"Oh that's you",,,

So I hope this reaches the ACLU who will connect with the other agencies I wrote..

AMERICA IS UNDER ATTACK BY THE NSA AND THERE HELPERS...

Some agency dotted my entire life,,my neighborhood with the names of people in the US government,,Wall Street and Bankers too....
For along time I wondered how so many years ago they knew who would be a problem to America/corrupt,,,
Generational corruption...

Hopefully somebody will read this and connect these agencies.

Know that this technology the NSA is setting up is deadly,,
Know that what ever the NSA has the agency in my life has it better,,,
Every agency in our government has a job,,,
DOJ prosecutes
FBI investigates...
Etc...

Whom ever is in my home is LAW,,BIG LAW,,National and International LAW,,an agency that only moves under the heading of the WORLD AT PERIL...

The Bush took on and SUPER SECRET SECRET SERVICE,,,
A unit that our Secret Service might not have known exsisted..

I think Bush has the distinction of being the first person to put in FULL MOTION an agency that's been around since the 30's.
I will say this,,they have no prejudice...
They don't care if your white,rich and powerful,,,the man digging in the dumpster for food is equal...
That's probably good...

Our civil liberties have been robbed and the aclu is the most well funded and prominent group that works protect them. They dragged their feet on impeachment therefore turning their backs on the constitution. George Bush should give thanks to so called opponets like the aclu. I am always happy to hear Nader who seems to cut through the BS and get to the heart of the matter. I however feel Obama by funding the occupations is already guilty of war crimes. chris Dorsey, RVA4Peace

GO, Ralph Nader. The democrats are already guilty of being obstructionists, failing to uphold their pledges as congresspeople to uphold the constitution. Obama, like Pelosi, were obstructionists, in their failure to impeach, indict, and prosecute war criminals,and corporate criminals.

But I suspect, the reason they are jellyfish with no backbones, is that many of these democrats, like Pelosi, Jane Harman and others sat in on secret committe hearings of the Republicans and were told of the crimes being committed and said nothing, did nothing, thus just as guilty as all three branches of government being complicit in the corporate proto fascist police state. The judicial Nazis helped Bush stonewall the legal process endlessly promoting legal tricks to keep innocent detainees inside concentration camps.

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